HYBRIDISATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 209 
COMMUNICATIONS SENT TO THE CONFERENCE. 
HYBRIDISATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 
By Professor L. H. Batney, Cornell University, Ithaca, U.S.A. 
In considering the status of hybridisation in any country two courses 
are open to the reviewer. He may make an inventory of the specific 
experiments in hybridisation with discussions thereon, or he may 
attempt a bold summary of the results. One is the method of details ; 
the other is the method of conclusions. It is this latter method, I take 
it, which your Secretary had in mind when he asked me for a short 
paper on hybridisation in the United States. I therefore attempt, with 
few sentences, to express judgment upon the progress of hybridisation 
in this country, upon the present status, the tendencies, and the 
prospect. 
It is first of all necessary that the European reader should know that the 
standards of judgment are unlike on the two sides of the Atlantic. This 
is because the natural and economic conditions are unlike in the two 
continents. Relative to the entire area, intensive gardening is less fre- 
quent in America thanin Europe. There are, relatively, fewer glass- 
houses. There is less interest in individual plants. There is less of the 
amateur’s instinct. On the other hand there is, relatively, more large- 
area horticulture. Fruit-growing has developed farther than elsewhere 
in the world. There is relatively greater interest in cosmopolitan varie- 
ties—in those which are adapted to wide ranges of conditions. It is 
therefore evident that there must be less interest in hybrids merely because 
they are hybrids; for hybrids are valued most where there is the greatest 
number of fanciers, or the most persons who grow plants for the intel- 
lectual interest in the individual specimen. 
Again, the interest in individual plants is gratified in small gardens, 
in which the conditions are under control. The varieties of Europe can 
be grown in these gardens. Glass and water and shade and highly 
fertile soil and skilled labour will grow almost any plant. Our taste for 
the choice horticultural rarities and curiosities is supplied very largely by 
varieties of European origin. We buy your hybrids, and Iam sure that you 
would not have it otherwise. The highly bred Cannas, Tulips, Roses, 
and many other plants are as frequent and as good in American gardens 
as in European; but the greater number of them are of Kuropean 
origin. 
Our great problem is to make the country productive. There are as 
many different climates and physiographical conditions in the United States 
as in the whole of Europe. The plants must grow in the sun and the 
rain and the drought, and be able to hold their own. ‘There are great 
stretches adapted to fruits and vegetables and flowers. These areas must 
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